Walking Italy’s Scenic Towns IV: Amalfi to Ravello

(A momentary departure from Orcas Island life, continued from Walking Italy’s Scenic Towns III: Sorrento…)

This is a day I had looked forward to for a long time.

If you look up the Amalfi Coast on Google, it gives you thousands of stunning images. This is my favorite one, and I had made it my computer’s screen saver months ago. In other words, I had been staring at this view for a long time, absorbing the feeling it gave me.

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Once the trip was closer and it looked like it might actually happen, I searched the internet for clues as to where that photo had been taken. It seemed to come from a place called Villa Cimbrone – a historic-place-turned-hotel with extended gardens hovering over the coastline slightly east of Amalfi and straight up the mountain in a town called Ravello.

It’s the first place I wanted to see on the Amalfi Coast.

We boarded the ferry and set out on the sea, rounding the bend toward the towns of the Amalfi Coast, passing the island of Capri along the way.

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It’s a beautiful way to experience the place, and you feel you’ve covered quite a bit of maritime territory by the time you reach the first stop, the town of Positano.

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This town is on magazine and book covers, especially in photos taken at sunset and dusk when the yellow building lights are on, sparkling next to the evening sky’s luminescent oranges, pinks, and purples.

We stayed on the boat; we’d be getting off at the second stop – the town of Amalfi. While people deboarded and others came on, we took the opportunity to take way too many photos.

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You’ll see daytime Amalfi looking like this on the internet – its colors either bumped up to look more digitally dazzling or toned down to look more ‘old Italy.’

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Dozens of boats zoomed in and out of Positano’s little entry and exit platform as we bobbed in each wake. Then off we went, headed east to Amalfi.

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We got off the ferry and began walking, leaving Amalfi behind to enjoy later. I was one-track-minded, headed for Ravello. From my internet research, I knew we could either catch a bus up the mountain or walk on our own eight legs to the view at the top. I wanted to walk it and soak in every minute of the experience on the way up!

When starting out from Amalfi, you can either walk along the narrow road to the next town around the bend called Atrani, or you can opt for going through the gigantic pedestrian tunnel connecting the two towns.

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Then voila! You’re out in the blue-sky day again, looking toward this postcard view of Atrani.

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And you’re also now on the narrow road with little cars whooshing past your legs as they barely clear the vehicles coming at them from the other lane.

Just look at that water. It’s every bit as amazing as it looks in the photo. But we’ll get to that down the road (literally).

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Now here’s the thing. I had put this Google map in my Notes app, which shows several routes for walking to Ravello. None of those goes straight to Villa Cimbrone. And do you see right in the middle in teal where it says Terrazza dell’Infinito? That was our destination. I figured once we were on the ground in Italy, we’d ask locals where to go and it would become clear.

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Well, we asked locals where to go, and they said to stay along the road you see in the map that goes right in the center of the other options. It makes sense, from the map standpoint, but there began the walk our family won’t soon forget. Especially our younger son.

From the first step along this road, it was relentlessly uphill. In intense sun. Thick, near-100% humidity. Sweat pouring down with no shade for cover. Solid gradient. Nonstop.

I loved every minute of it. My husband did too. We seek out this kind of stuff. Our older son silently moved along at a brisk pace. But for the younger one, lighthearted exploration quickly turned to endless trudging. Acute thirst turned to complete disinterest in his bottle of hot water. He’s a fantastic walker and can usually go and go without flinching, but I can’t blame him for feeling what he was feeling in the heat.

Meanwhile, amazing scenery kept us tapping away at the little white circles on our phone cameras, trying to keep them dry before beads of sweat rolled onto them.

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At this point I was beginning to think our younger one could soon cross the threshold into heat exhaustion. He was still walking well, but his head was pounding and he began saying he wouldn’t make it any farther. Our kids can usually do just about anything when it comes to exertion, but I knew I needed to listen. I told him to slow way down, and I let the other two know that we’d meet them at the top at some point.

Just before we got too separated, my husband called out that there was a mirage – or perhaps a real oasis in the desert! Up this winding, remote-feeling road (except for the buses we could have opted to take that were zooming past us now and then), there was a grocery store set into the rock on the right side. No way! These narrow roads with no turnouts or parking areas made for the strangest grocery store location ever.

I think our son was in an instant state of elation.

In we went for large bottles of cold water and peach juice.

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It’s amazing what a little cold hydration can do for the system. Revived and refreshed after about 15 minutes, we set out again on the fry-an-egg-on-the-concrete road.

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All of the guide books say that August is the month to avoid traveling to Italy. It’s the hottest month, and it’s also the month when Italians take their own vacations around the country and throughout Europe. But August was our only choice due to my husband’s coaching schedule, so we went for it. Normally, locals close cafes, shops, and restaurants so they can take time off, but because COVID shut everything down for so long, every business was in full swing, making up for lost time while we were there. What a boon!

Not much further up the road, my husband noticed a trail that looked like it headed in the direction we ultimately wanted to go. Not having any idea where it really led, we took a chance. Was it ancient? Was it used by farmers? Would we end up in a tangle of overgrown olive orchards? We had no idea.

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Soon enough, we could see what looked like Villa Cimbrone up high.

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He had found a wonderful shortcut!

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Before we knew it, we were walking along beautiful gardens with lemon groves.

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Join us, entering Villa Cimbrone…

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And here’s the view I had daydreamed about for months at my kitchen table…

*I say in the video above that this vista is “towering high above the town of Ravello.” No. It is towering high above the Amalfi Coast. The town of Ravello is up here in the heights too.

What a stunning day it was to look down on the sea.

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We basked in the feeling as long as possible before exploring the gardens surrounding the Terrazza dell’Infinito.

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I spent a fair bit of time trying to locate the perch from which my screen saver photo was taken. No angle I happened upon quite resembled it. You need about a week up there to walk around slowly and take it all in, but we only had part of a day. We would need to start down the mountain again. There was a pathway leading the opposite direction from where we entered, headed farther eastward in this high place. Could we be missing a lot by leaving so soon?

We found out that the path led right into the town of Ravello, and that’s where the buses arrived and departed. Knowing how our younger son was feeling about the idea of walking back down the way we came, I set aside my own desire to hoof it back to Amalfi, and into Ravello we walked.

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High above the ocean and set in a bit sat this quaint little village with interesting shops, cafes, and a gigantic open courtyard, or piazza. It had a peaceful, relaxing vibe, and I wished we had all the time in the world to while more days away exploring. We gave ourselves only enough time to transfer some money, buy bus tickets to Amalfi, and look around for about ten minutes.

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We were starting to get the feeling that you can walk anywhere in Italy if you can find the right footpath. There seemed to be old, perhaps ancient stone footpaths everywhere. Had a narrow, magical little walkway from Amalfi to Ravello eluded us? Was there one somewhere, or was the road we walked the best way to get there? My husband had a sneaking suspicion that an entrance to a path was somewhere right under our noses, and he found it. On no! How we longed to walk down it, but at this point we had to pass it by and head to the bus stop or we’d leave little time for ourselves in the town of Amalfi before boarding the ferry back to Sorrento.

We wished we had the chance to start fresh and walk that path up!

I took a few final photos in Ravello at the world’s most beautiful bus stop, and off we went down the mountain, the luxury of comfortable seats and air conditioning gliding us effortlessly through time and space.

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Welcome to the town of Amalfi, with its main street just steps from sunbathers on the coastline.

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Up to this point in the day (3:30 PM), there had been little talk of eating. It was becoming a theme, actually. So much to see and do, so little time to eat. Go, go, go; walk; take photos; soak in everything possible in the short time we have; then go, go, go again. With heat and humidity, the appetite was already naturally suppressed.

As we merged into the flurry of Amalfi tourism, the first thirst-quenching stop immediately arrested our forward movement – refreshing lemon gelato. A lot of it! In between halves of hollow lemons.

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The portions were so enormous that they were almost impossible to finish. It’s a good thing, because those things were costly!

Hands sticky with melted, lemony sugar water, we looked around for a solution and noticed something odd. People were filling their water bottles and splashing their faces in a nearby water fountain.

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Huh. That’s something you never see in our country. Here began our education with Italy’s water. Many – most? all? I’m not sure – towns and cities have clean water flowing out of fountains, spigots, or pipes. Sometimes it’s ongoing; you don’t even have to turn a handle; water continues to flow out whether someone is there to use it or not.

Not all fountains are safe but the ones that have clean water are obvious – everyone is using them. We learned that some water systems set up hundreds of years ago are still fully functioning and safe, used every day. Wow!

Our older son would be the last person to take advantage of a woman’s immodesty for a Kodak moment, but I just had to ask him to pose for this silly photo opportunity.

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Our kids were quickly exposed to the human form in every way with each passing day of traveling through the towns of Italy. My husband and I grew up in warm, coastal California where it’s normal for guys to be shirtless and for girls to wear swimsuits and short shorts, or bra tops when jogging. But here on Orcas Island, it’s unusual to see undressed bodies unless you’re at the lake in July. Otherwise, people are usually covered from head to toe.

All of us were unaccustomed to seeing so much flesh; between thong-clad women tanning on the beaches and statues of naked men all over the place, it was a little different at first until the initial shock wore off. Then it became just as commonplace as seeing a gelato stand.

Once washed off, we had little time left to look around Amalfi. Soon (5 PM) we were on our ferry, bobbing in the wake of another flurry of pleasure boats.

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Clouds formed, Capri loomed in the distance, and we made our way back to Sorrento’s sheer-cliff coastline for the evening. I couldn’t help but wonder if we should start again the next day in Ravello on the old historic footpath my husband found back down the mountain to the sea.

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It’s only now that something silly dawned on me. While searching again for the origin of that photo on my screen saver a few moments ago, I came across a different photo that has the same tree and building in it. See them there at the top right corner of the picture below? Now look at the caption.

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‘Gardens in Villa Rufolo’ – Ahhhh! All along I was hunting down the view, thinking it was from Villa Cimbrone, only to find out, now back at my kitchen table after that whole trip, that it was from a completely different villa in Ravello!

I just looked on Google maps to find this location. It’s mere steps from the giant courtyard in Ravello that I just wrote about above! In fact, I took a photo of it without ever knowing what it was until now!

I guess we’ll just have to return to the Amalfi Coast someday. I’d go back in a heartbeat.

Steps: 20,527 (~9 miles)

Miles from Sorrento to Amalfi, via ferry: No clue

Next stop: Minori and Maiori

Walking Italy’s Scenic Towns I: The Planning

Walking Italy’s Scenic Towns II: Rome Arrival

Walking Italy’s Scenic Towns III: Sorrento

Walking Italy’s Scenic Towns V: Minori to Maiori

Walking Italy’s Scenic Towns VI: The Isle of Capri

Walking Italy’s Scenic Towns VII: Capri’s Marina Piccola

Photo of Villa Rufolo from www.ravello.com

I just happened upon the coolest YouTube video series called Prowalk Tours. You can choose various city tours to watch – walking, driving, boating, and aerial drone tours. If you’d like to quietly walk Ravello and Villa Cimbrone for an hour and 20 minutes – no narration, only captions with historical facts – it’s a fantastic way to do it. It literally feels like YOU are walking around seeing it all, and it encapsulates similar experiences we had plus additional footage of places we didn’t see. Here it is. Same thing goes with the town of Amalfi here.